[Web-SIG] Defining a standard interface for common web tasks

[amk at amk.ca]

On Fri, Oct 17, 2003 at 01:51:50PM -0700, Bill Janssen wrote:
> 1)  A good CGI module.  This should allow clear access to the various
> values passed in the environment, as Simon points out.  I think the
> current "cgi" module isn't bad at this, but I'm sure we can find
> shortcomings.

* Too much cruft.  We could either deprecate stuff in cgi.py with a
  vengeance, or think up some new package organization.

> 2) A standard Apache plug-in.  Does mod_python fill this role?  (Should
> this really be part of the stdlib?)  

Too much work for the stdlib.  Apache support suffers from the split between
Apache versions 1.3 and 2.0; the API changed a *lot* between the two
versions, but both versions are still pretty common.  Leave it to mod_python.

> 3)  A standard stand-alone solution, but better than the three standard
> servers already in the stdlib.  I been using Medusa lately, and rather
> like its approach to things.

The problem is that the code in the Medusa package is written really
unconventionally -- classes have lowercase names, it's still 1.5 (and often
1.4!) compatible -- and there's a lot of cruft here, too; it's often not
clear which modules are intended for actual use and which ones are
half-baked experiments.  This could be cleaned up if it's deemed worth the
effort; I initially didn't want to embark on a big class renaming because I
thought Twisted would quickly and completely replace Medusa, but that seems
unlikely to happen.

--amk